Saturday, 31 March 2012

Ferrari’s Felipe Massa has been speaking about his team’s preparations for the 2012 Formula 1 season. Check out our Ferrari review for 2011! The Brazilian – who will take part in testing this week – believes that he will try many new ideas as they look to find a winning formula for the season ahead. [...]

In an exclusive interview with the Guardian as his 80th birthday approaches, F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone speak out about a variety of subjects, from the future of the sport to Margaret Thatcher, Hitler, Saddam Hussein, democracy, football and what continues to drive him.

The way I feel at the moment, why stop? I do it because I enjoy it. And yesterday is gone. I don't care what happened yesterday. What else would I do? People retire to die. I don't get any individual pleasure because we don't win races or titles in this job. I'm like most business people. You look back at the end of the year and you see what you've achieved by working out how much money the company has made. That's it.

An excellent insight into the world of F1 as it used to be can be found on the regularly-interesting Letters of Note website. It publishes a hitherto unseen letter from Jochen Rindt to Lotus boss Colin Chapman written shortly after Rindt?s crash at Barcelona which was a result of the wing system on Lotus 49 collapsing at speed.

?Colin. I have been racing F1 for 5 years and I have made one mistake (I rammed Chris Amon in Clermont Ferrand) and I had one accident in Zandvoort due to gear selection failure otherwise I managed to stay out of trouble. This situation changed rapidly since I joined your team. ?Honestly your cars are so quick that we would still be competitive with a few extra pounds used to make the weakest parts stronger, on top of that I think you ought to spend some time checking what your different employes are doing, I sure the wishbones on the F2 car would have looked different. Please give my suggestions some thought, I can only drive a car in which I have some confidence, and I feel the point of no confidence is quite near.?

A little more than a year later Rindt's Lotus suffered mechanical breakdown just before braking into one of the corners. He swerved violently to the left and crashed into a poorly-installed barrier, killing him instantly.

Fernando Alonso's face as he stood on the top step of the podium said it all - a mixture of extreme satisfaction, delight and disbelief.

"Incredible, incredible," he said in Spanish in his television interviews immediately afterwards, and that seemed as good a summing up as any of one of the most remarkable and thrilling grands prix for some time.

Alonso's victory was the 28th of his career and it moved him ahead of Sir Jackie Stewart in the all-time list of winners - he is now behind only Michael Schumacher, Alain Prost, Ayrton Senna and Nigel Mansell, whose 31 wins are his next target.

The Ferrari team leader's presence in such celebrated company is a reminder, as if one was needed, of what a great grand prix driver Alonso is and it was appropriate that his drive on Sunday was one that befitted such a landmark.

Alonso moved up to fifth on the all-time victories list with his win in Malaysia. Photo: Getty

Arguably not the greatest qualifier, Alonso has produced some stunning races in his career, and the one in Malaysia on Sunday ranks up there with the very best.

The Ferrari in its current form has no business whatsoever being able to win a race. In normal, dry conditions, it is way off the pace of the McLaren, Red Bull, Mercedes and Lotus, and almost certainly slower also than the Williams and the Sauber.

And yet there was Alonso, up in fifth place from eighth on the grid by the end of lap one, challenging world champion Sebastian Vettel's Red Bull, which he moved ahead of thanks to stopping one lap earlier for wet tyres in the downpour that led to the race being stopped on lap six.

What won him the race, though, were the laps after the re-start.

He emerged in the lead on lap 16, helped by McLaren having to hold Lewis Hamilton in the pits as Felipe Massa came past.

After everyone had stopped for intermediate tyres, Alonso was 2.4 seconds ahead of Sauber's Sergio Perez - of whose stunning performance more later - and 6.2secs ahead of Lewis Hamilton in the McLaren.

At that point, most would have expected Hamilton - one of the greatest wet-weather drivers in history - to close in on the two cars ahead of him. Instead, Alonso pulled away from Perez, who himself pulled away from Hamilton.

This was, as BBC F1 co-commentator David Coulthard said, "Alonso at his brilliant best", as he built an eight-second lead over Perez in 12 laps.

Alonso is such a benchmark, so peerless, so utterly relentless and unforgiving when he senses a sniff of a win, that it seemed impossible at that stage that he would not win the race.

But then Perez began to come back at him - showing the differing characteristics of the two cars that have been apparent since the start of pre-season testing. The Ferrari is hard on its tyres and the Sauber is the opposite.

Closer and closer Perez got, first by fractions, then by full seconds until by lap 40 he appeared to have Alonso at his mercy.

Stopping a lap earlier than Perez for 'slick' dry-weather tyres put his lead back up to seven seconds, but on these the Sauber was even more superior.

Perez was within a second of Alonso by lap 48 - with eight to go - and what would have been a fully deserved victory by a man who from the beginning of his career last year has looked destined for great things seemed inevitable.

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F1 being what it is, a lot may well be made of the radio call that Perez received at about this point. "Checo, be careful, we need this position," he was told by his team, who use Ferrari engines. Was this simply a team that is known to be struggling for finance sensibly warning an excited young driver to make sure he didn't bin it when a valuable podium place was up for grabs? Or was it, as some will surmise, team orders in disguise, an order not to try to deprive the company on whose largesse they have depended in many more seasons than this one of a much-needed win? If it was a team order, Perez didn't seem to pay any attention - he continued to push hard until he made that fateful error. And team principal Monisha Kaltenborn dismissed any thoughts of a conspiracy.

"What we meant was get the car home," she said. "It was important to us to get the result - there was nothing else to it. There was no instruction."

Either of them would have been a deserving winner after two superlative drives - and there were other noteworthy performances down the field, too.

Bruno Senna showed something of his famous uncle's wet-weather skills with his climb up from last place at the restart to finish an impressive sixth.

And Toro Rosso's Jean-Eric Vergne, who narrowly missed out on a point on his debut last weekend in Australia, delivered in spades with a sure-footed drive in the treacherous conditions at Sepang.

The Frenchman was the only driver to stick with intermediate tyres in the early downpour, and he continued to perform impressively on his way to eighth place, just behind last year's rookie of the year Paul di Resta, who also looked good.

Senna, Vergne and most of all Perez clearly have bright futures ahead of them.

But ahead of them all was the man whose consistent excellence over a 10-year career not only they but everyone else in F1 has to aspire to.

"Great race for Alonso, top job, and also Perez," Jenson Button said on Sunday evening in Malaysia. You can say that again.

Friday, 30 March 2012

Hello there? How's your winter been? I hope this blog finds you well, my friends, and that 2012 is being kind to you. It's certainly about to get kinder for us F1 fans as the season gets under way this weekend.

My winter flew by faster than Seb in qualifying as I juggled various TV commitments, along with the usual jobs such as visiting the dentist, watching Norwich City (amazing!) and doing a spot of gardening (thankfully my garden is tiny) - all things that between March and November there just isn't time for!

Thankfully, just a couple of weeks ago I managed to grab a week in the Maldives with my wife, and that break will be valuable as I jump onto a treadmill that will carry us to the end of 2012.

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As you know this weekend is the start of a new era of F1 coverage on the BBC, and the job for the team over the winter has been to best deal with the cards we've been dealt in terms of the broadcast rights.

Having sat through various production meetings, having exchanged emails, swapped ideas and planned how best to bring the season to life, I'm confident we will deliver a new-look season that you will enjoy.

It's been like the first day at school for some of the new faces to our team this weekend. Gary Anderson and I got the tram together to collect our accreditation when we arrived in Melbourne on Thursday morning and it was great fun being regaled by stories of F1 from the days when Gary was designing race winning cars.

He also had a few decent stories about being employed by Eddie Jordan but I think they're best left out off the blog - as entertaining as they were!

I'd also really like to welcome Ben Edwards to the fray. Ben is a great commentator who has raced cars himself and spent the last few years commentating on all forms of motor racing.

He's passionate, informative, hopefully likes a night out and a beer, and best of all he's as much a journalist as he is a fan. Good luck keeping David Coulthard in check Ben!

Talking of DC, we had our first dinner of the new season together last night as we both headed out for some Japanese food and a drop of sake here in buzzy, beautiful Melbourne.

Pastor Maldonado, Bruno Senna and Lewis Hamilton were all in there tucking into sushi and sashimi while working out whether to chat to each other or act cool and bag an early psychological advantage ahead of a year when the competition will be intense.

They mainly opted for the latter by the way. I'll post a blog later in the season about how the drivers live and work together while still being rivals - it's fascinating.

Meanwhile on radio we've got a whole new team - and it's a great line-up of commentator James Allen, pit-lane reporter Jennie Gow and co-commentator Jaime Alguersuari, who brings real insight having just stepped out of an F1 car himself.

So, what have I learned so far this week? Well I've been told that the two new drivers at Toro Rosso have made Mark Webber feel more motivated than ever.

I chatted to Jenson Button who (if it's possible) seems even more chilled out than he did in 2011.

I've also been to the other end of the paddock where Caterham say the decision to put Vitaly Petrov in the car instead of Jarno Trulli is the right move regarding both finances and the future - and I've heard plenty of speculation and gossip surrounding HRT and Marussia, who have not run at all in pre-season.

Anyway, it's amazing how quickly we all get back into the swing of F1. My 'no crisps' rule lasted all of 30 minutes, the first running order for Saturday's qualifying show has been written, and I've got a date with Chris Moyles on Radio 1.

We're delighted to be back, I'm really happy DC and EJ remain part of the team, and this weekend don't worry about setting your alarm.

We've got highlights of qualifying at 1pm on Saturday, and a full two-hour highlights show from 2pm on Sunday. We'll have all the important action, and plenty of driver interviews and race reaction.

Three years ago I started these blogs - there will be plenty more coming your way in our fourth season of coverage. But what you get is up to you - what do you want to see here during the season..?

I am going to be painting a body in black smoke pearl with a pearl green strip soon and I was wondering if you guys had any tips. I have never worked with this type of paint so any info would be appreciated such as if it needs a base coat and/ or tips on how to apply it. The black will be done out of a rattle can and the green stripe will be done out of an airbrush if that matters. Also the body is a 69 Camaro if the shape has any effect on the paint. Thanks for any info.

Thursday, 29 March 2012

So as luck would have it, I got something in the mail today that is going to be my next project when my ' 53 Hudson is done. And what better way to start a wip than from the very beginning, right? This is going to make some people shake their heads, a few might even cry or swear, but with all due respect if any of them had wanted to buy this and have it sit on a shelf I wouldn't have any problem with what they choose to do with their money. Myself I've wanted one of these for ages, and I had the oppurtunity to acquire one so I let myself treat myself as I sometimes do. Built it shall be, possibly in red if I can find a close enough match to the factory color, if not I'll choose a Duplicolor paint that's close to one of the other factory flavors. So, on to the photos.

Riding around town or in the countryside need not always be about pure speed thrills. So for those that prefer a change of pace and take their time while basking in the sights, sounds, and smells of the world passing by, the Moto Guzzi Norge GT 8V is the bike for you.

At the heart of the Norge GT 8V is a V-shaped 90� transverse twin-cylinder "Four valve" engine, considered the highest performing engine among all the families of powertrains manufactured at Mandello del Lario. Riding along that impressive powertrain is the Norge?s soft suspension, one that can be adjusted for preload front and rear with the shocks featuring rebound adjustment.

All the improvements done in the development of the bike’s powertrain have also increased the Norge’s overall drive dynamics. The changes in setting of the suspension, such as replacing the spring set on the fork and shock absorber, allow the bike to achieve optimal hydraulic response on the two suspension units. Moreover, the bike also comes with a powerful, new electronic ABS braking system which is combined with front brake discs fitted with a new high performance brake band. This setup provides the kind of safety standards that make riding this bike easy.